Amber Submission
by avtorSola
Summary: When your coping mechanism is slowly killing you, someone's bound to notice. But the price he pays to keep those silver sorrows frozen in ice is something that others won't stand for. Past GinHitsu.
**A/N: Um. Uh. Yeah. I don't know either. I haven't written straight-up Hitsu angst in a while. Enjoy anyway.**

 **ALSO - the BDSM-themed part of this DOES NOT depict a healthy BDSM relationship. It's sexual abuse, plain and simple. Healthly BDSM relationships ARE NOT sexual abuse. Clear? Good.**

* * *

There are some days on which he wishes that the slender lines of his lithe frame angled into the ground at slightly less of a careless slant; that the smirking arrogance of his mere presence was tempered by a wholesome purity, as it had been when he'd been young and fresh-faced. But he knows his reflection well, and the debonair elegance of his lissom body is tainted by dark sensuality, a sultry glamour that entranced the eye. The sharp edge of his chiseled jaw is a blade forged of passionate lust and passionless pain, a tempting glimpse of the temporary pleasure he can offer, and the sexual glint in that half-lidded emerald stare is a succulent promise of his submissive desire, a gleam of vulnerability restrained by want. Seduction is his poison now, a cold allure that draws moths to the frozen burn of his fire and shatters their fragile wings in a shower of winking snowflakes. But today is not one of those days. Today his empty shell is even more destitute than usual, the dry husk of his cold body beginning to crack in the same way that the wings of his prey usually do, and so he abandons his mask and gives in to the primal urging.

Silently, his footsteps lighter than the beats of a butterfly's wing, he slips from his lieutenant's grasping fingertips like water, melting away in a rush of silvery-turning-amber liquid as he disappears. He does this too often now; flees like a shadow at the approach of night and melds into the surrounding roughness of Rukongai. He's an adult finally, as evidenced by the captivating enchantment of his chiseled face and come-hither stare, but still he tiptoes along the unspoken lines he had drawn at the beginning of his captaincy all those years ago. Perfection is his middle name and dignity is his first name, and because the dark cravings of his blighted soul would decimate his reputation he pretends that he is fine even as he indulges behind their backs.

He dresses in plain clothes for a disguise - a simple shirt, black sport jacket, and dark jeans - and leaves the familiar routine of his division for the chaos of Rukongai's infamous red-light districts, the whirl of bars and brothels a kaleidoscopic mess in his blurring stare. He's been here too often, but at the same time he knows that he is unrecognizable to these people, isolated as they are from Seireitei. And so, quietly, when he sidles into a frequented, nearby nightclub and immediately heads for the bar, all he has to do is order from the smirking bartenders. No questions asked. His money can buy anything in this place.

Whiskey scorches his throat, and he relishes the burn.

Within the space of twenty minutes, he's on his third tumbler of bourbon, the ice clinking noisily under the rumbling bass of the nightclub, and slowly the bartenders are realizing that he's intent on getting completely wasted, and so one silently refills his glass whenever he sets it down on the coaster. As the alcohol starts to kick in, distorting his thought processes, the stares of the men and women in the club start to become more piercing, more penetrative, and he sighs lustily, turning around to face the music.

A thousand years rolls by in the blink of an eye, and yet every second is an eternity trapped in amber, crystallized like a fossil unlucky enough to be crushed underfoot. He leans back against the counter, turning an indolent, sly gaze onto the golden lights winking dizzyingly quickly overhead, the drifting, lazy circles that the trailing light left in their wake slow to fade in his gaze. Thundering bass vibrates in his bones, yet even in this sea of pulsing people the lack of a matching beat in his chest makes the world painfully silent. Slowly, he allows the glass in his hand to again sway up to his lips, staining his tongue with amber honey, the rich bourbon sliding down his throat like hot acid, burning his cold husk of a body as it goes. A sneer curls his face into something dark as he lazily recalls the days when he refused to drink.

He had been a young man then, little more than a boy stumbling baby steps into budding adulthood. Young and innocent, and his heart had still been filled with love instead of this howling pain, this aching agony that chills him to the core where his heart should be a fire in his chest. Obviously he was not still that innocent, however. He had lost his innocence many times over, beginning with a silver flash and a haunting, sly smile. This would merely be a reminder of that ultimate betrayal, when the man who'd taken his heart left with it still grasped tightly in his spiderlike hands, smiling at his young lover's agony, that wide grin masking the sorrow beneath.

He laughs up at the gleaming golden lights, a soft chuckle that turns into a sensual shiver. His gaze is at half-mast, the world swimming pleasantly about him in circles, and he knows he's a sight to behold. Pale cheeks are flushed scarlet with drink and heated desire, the gemstone green of his eyes glimmering with invitation, his lean body opened to the appreciative eyes roaming over his svelte frame. The dim amber glow from overhead casts slight shadows beneath his high cheekbones, accentuating his slight build despite his adult height, and the illuminating tongue flicks out of a man's mouth to explicate the effect he's having on the mass of writhing bodies on the dance floor.

The whiskey drenches his mind in grief as the night wanes into the wee hours of the morning, but it slowly distills his inhibition into a puddle of melted slop, so when another man, tall and broad, with a growling, domineering smile and the mildest of intoxicated flushes approaches him, he can only watch. He's completely smashed by now, his thoughts muddled, but he quite clearly remembers why he came to this seedy area of Rukongai, and it looks like he's achieved his aim.

"Well, aren't you something..." the dark-haired beast of a man says in a low purr, and through hazy, alcohol-blurred vision, Hitsugaya knows he's stumbled upon exactly what he's looking for. A few hiccup-laced words and a breathy, pitched whine are all it takes for the broad-shouldered man to grip his narrow hips and pull him into the darkened back of the nightclub. He doesn't resist as he's manhandled roughly through a series of doorways and finally dragged into one of the naughty back rooms, because the pain sends a hot flash of feeling back through his cold body. The man who'd hustled him into the small, cell-like room shuts the door behind them and advances, pinning his prey to the wall with bruising force. Hitsugaya whimpers vividly, color and light flashing in his vision, his intoxication making every one of his sensations both duller and more keen simultaneously. And his captor smiles viciously.

"Clothes off."

He obeys without question.

The amber dawn light is leaking through blacked-out windows by the time the broad-shouldered man leaves, sated by the night and the naked body of the young man lying crumpled on the floor, gasping in pain, the angry red marks of a whip crisscrossing his back and thighs. Blood trickles down his legs, his entire body trembling, the buzzing roar of a slowly building headache thundering in his skull, but the tearing pain in his lower back and rectum sends a blinding realization of his continued existence into his mind, and he pants on the floor, crying silent tears. It isn't normal or healthy, what he's doing, but it seems to be the only thing that's helped him cope with his abandonment, with his former lover's teasing departure that tore out his very soul.

Sometimes he questions it. Why does subjecting himself to this torment help? Why does he need to drink himself into insanity to forget that man's face? Why does he let others abuse his body for their own pleasure just to erase that man's memory with blinding pain? It's not good for him, and one day he knows he's going to break into a thousand gleaming pieces of the amber eternity he spent drowning in that Cheshire grin and intoxicating seafoam stare, but the parody of submission at the hands of an abusive, cruel dominant quiets the restless sorrow that threatens to shatter his wings. The bruises and blood of each successive sexual abusing drains the eagerness he feels for death and darkness and replaces them with a functioning shell that can fool everyone who sees it.

And to him, as long as he endures, then maybe he'll suffer enough to atone for being so insufficient as to keep his love by his side.

He limps back to his house later that day, avoiding everyone he sees, and collapses into bed with a whimper of pain. He can barely walk, and his head is swimming from alcohol consumption, yet the cracking ice has been mended into a sheer wall. He passes out for a solid twelve hours, and when he next wakes up his head is crumpling in on itself, squeezing his brain between two concrete slabs, and seeing light is like being stabbed, yet he can't move to shut the blinds because his bruised hips are slightly swollen, the raised welts on his back protest every movement, and the torn flesh inside him screams in agony every time his muscles tense. So he lies there, miserable and reveling in every second of his wretchedness. The terrible blisters on his wrists and ankles where the metal cuffs had rubbed his skin raw stung, the marks of his bondage etched in unmistakable sores on his limbs.

And then Matsumoto walks into his room with red eyes, and everything goes south. It turns out that the twelve hours he'd thought he'd slept had actually been thirty-six, during which unremembered nightmares and what seemed like a fever had plagued him. He starts in shock, bloodshot eyes widening in disbelief as Unohana follows her into his room.

"...Taicho?" Matsumoto whispers, her red-rimmed gaze enough to tell him exactly how much she's seen. He stills, pounding skull loosing his horror to pass across his face. Carefully, he raises his head, wincing as the world spins around him, and sees that someone - most likely Matsumoto - has changed him into a warm sleeping yukata. He curses loudly, trying to prevent the tears from coming, because it wasn't their goddamn business, but Unohana steps carefully closer to him and he understands that they've made him their business. Her expression is gentle, almost pitying.

"Hitsugaya-taicho, do you remember who did this to you?" she asks, her voice soft, like she thinks he's going to break at any moment. He realizes that they don't understand that this was his choice - his personal decision - and so he laughs in a cracking voice, turning his head away.

"I'm not innocent anymore, Unohana." he says, his voice a mere shade of the cold snap it's always been, but he knows that the tempestuous glowing allure of his face and body are slowly returning in full devastating force. And for the first time, he thinks Unohana sees, because she says nothing to him. But then he feels her hand move to rest on his abdomen, the familiar-warmth of kaido lighting her palm and seeping through the layers of smooth and striated tissue. He jerks away from the warmth alleviating his pain and cries out softly as his abused body protests, the sound of his own voice lancing through his hungover brain. But it's enough for her to understand. Unohana merely gazes at him, tears clinging to her long eyelashes.

"You're bleeding internally, Hitsugaya-kun." she says tremulously, and when Matsumoto's eyes widen in sudden realization his lips curl in a cold smile, his head throbbing with pain.

"I don't care." he hisses bitterly. Unohana's mouth opens in surprise - whatever she had expected, it wasn't that. The pity on her face begins to curdle into shock, and slowly, she pulls the blanket over him down to inspect the blisters and chafing redness of his wrists. Understanding whitens her lips and she leans close to smell his breath, which is still tainted by the tell-tale odor of alcohol. He does nothing, the cold shell back in place, his perfect mask blotting out his internal despair.

Matsumoto, as much as he loves the dear woman, can never understand the extent of his broken heart. But she's the only one who would have the faintest idea of his pain. Unohana will never be able to understand.

"...I will have to report this, you know." Unohana says quietly. Toushiro barks out another laugh of derisive sourness.

"Report what?" he deflects deftly. "It's the weekend. I'm off duty. How I spend my own time is none of your concern."

The implicit admission of his conscious choice to engage in activity which he bears physical marks of isn't lost on either of the two women.

"The extent of these injuries will require you to take at least three days off, Hitsugaya-taicho." Unohana rebuts, but he smirks in acrimonious victory.

"Never stopped me before." he says tightly. The room goes silent. Matsumoto stares at him.

"...before?"

The sound of her voice - her trust in his ability to care for himself - breaking is almost more than he can bear, and he deals with it in the only way he knows. His expression turns flinty.

"I __am__ an adult." his tone is biting with anger. "Even physically now. I'm not required to justify myself to anyone."

Unohana smiles mirthlessly down at him as Matsumoto wilts, her gaze flashing with sorrowful lightning.

"If you are charged as a danger to your own safety, then you are indeed required to justify your actions, Hitsugaya-taicho." she says levelly. "I'm coming close to suspending you from active duty until I can verify your mental stability. If this is indeed a habit, then it is extremely self-destructive."

The sheer injustice of that simple statement makes Hitsugaya's cold blood boil. His eyes narrow and he grinds his teeth together, causing a cacophony of sound to blare in his ears. The hangover he's nursing isn't doing wonders for his temper.

"I'm not dead yet, am I?" he hisses. "And who are you to judge my behavior, __Kenpachi Yachiru?__ "

Unohana's smile disappears. Now she looks angry, her blue stare narrowed to thin sapphire slits. Matsumoto looks on in shock. Nobody speaks to Unohana that way unless they have a death wish. However, given her captain's current state - back whipped raw, rectum bleeding steadily, limbs sporting marks which look distinctly like the chafing rawness left by ropes or handcuffs - and his defense of his apparent decision, she isn't sure that he isn't trying to achieve that end result after all.

"Captain Hitsugaya, I suggest you let me heal you without any fuss." the Fourth Division Captain says with an intense frown, her eyebrows lowered in warning.

"I suggest you __fuck off.__ " Hitsugaya snarls through the slur of his hangover. "Some people get off on pain."

Matsumoto flinches. The very idea of her straight-laced captain engaging in any kind of sexual activity is ludicrous, and yet...if one is to believe his words and the evidence provided by his condition, then he's been allowing people to use his body to sate their sadistic pleasure for much longer than anyone had suspected.

Unohana's reply is serene, but chilling.

"Yes. Some do." she agrees. "And some people try to blot out memories with it. Repeatedly drinking yourself into a haze and submitting to sexual abuse, whether willingly or not, is not the same thing as having a stable, secure partner who respects you enough to know when BDSM crosses the line. You are well aware that your habits are self-destructive."

Hitsugaya whitens at the pointed comment, and for a long moment Matsumoto wonders at the expression, confused by its appearance. But as Unohana's hands move to his abdomen again he shifts, still trying to writhe away from her despite his obvious pain, and suddenly the pieces click into place. But what is her captain trying to erase from his mind?

"It's my decision! Stop it!" he cries in protest, voice broken by pain and a hoarse rasp likely left over from prior screams. But Unohana restrains him gently, soft kido bonds holding him in place while Unohana's kaido painlessly mends the torn tissues inside him. He fights back, clinging to the pain he's feeling for some reason, but the blurred quality of his gaze suggests that the kaido the healing woman is using is sleep-inducing. Matsumoto watches helplessly as tears start to leak from Hitsugaya's eyes, his attractive face breaking into despairing denial, his seductive gaze shining with a deep-rooted feeling of violation. Agony whispers in every slanted line of his slender body.

"...Don't." he slurs faintly, and Unohana gazes down at him with pity in her eyes.

"I'm sorry, Hitsugaya-kun." she says quietly. "But I can't let you destroy yourself like this."

Hitsugaya gazes up at the cool, grey ceiling as she refuses his request, biting his lip to keep from screaming in emotional agony as the pain he's feeling vanishes into nothing. Why can't they understand that this __won't help__? He's spent too long pining for his lost lover; spent too long needing that man's roughness, the sharp jerks of the familiar teeth and hips, the domineering tug of the pale hand in his white hair, the silver flash of a smile and black-ribbon leather as he was bound and thoroughly dominated. He'd had that healthy relationship once, but now that he didn't, he needed the pain more than ever, the pain to remind himself that no one else could ever replace the man he'd lost.

He can still remember amber evenings spent carefully sipping bourbon in his lover's lap, hidden safely in the privacy of the older man's home, watching the sun set through the cracks in shuttered windows that laced the room in gold. He hadn't liked bourbon back then, hadn't liked any alcohol in all honestly, but he'd tasted the rich amber liquid for his partner's sake and had been rewarded with a peppering hail of sweet kisses. They'd joked about the older man's preference for bourbon sometimes. Toushiro had always teased him about his hatred for gin, but looking back, the younger ice-wielder sometimes wondered if that had been his way of trying to reveal himself.

Of trying to say, __one day, I'll leave you. And I hate myself for it.__

Unohana's ministrations and the calm, painless kido that holds him fast are a ghostly familiarity of the heated touches that the tall, lanky man had once littered on his skin. It's just dissimilar enough for him to notice the difference, but just similar enough to dredge up the rush of lusty memories, the remembrance of those large, pale hands on him. And he can't help the way that his icy wall begins to crack under the pressure, the cold nothingness of his existence yielding to the excruciating, enthralling agony of his soul. The very emotions he's been trying to seal into the sexual skin of his desirable body for five decades.

Seduction is his poison, but love is his cure, and he wants to stay sick forever because that's easier than admitting to loving a man who left him. Because dying a little more every day is simpler than living with the knowledge that he wasn't enough to keep the loyalty of the only man he'd ever given his heart to. Because drowning in an amber ocean is quicker than melting the silver chains which hold his heart captive forever. But Unohana, in healing him of the distracting physical pain, is taking away that golden diversion until the silver heartache is all that remains.

His breaths break into soft sobs as Unohana finishes fixing him to the best of her ability, and he lies limp on his pillows, head still swimming with the woozy aftereffects of his amber-alcoholic binge. Slowly Matsumoto creeps over to sit at his side, lifting his aching head into her lap with a tender touch so very like that of the man who had saved her life. He laughs brokenly.

"...I hate him." he murmurs weakly, and Matsumoto's silver eyes bore into his, an unspoken question in her gaze. His shoulders shake, and he lets the tears fall, feeling Matsumoto's hand run through his unruly white hair in soft circles. He wants his amber daydreams back instead of this cold silver reality, but even the sexy allure of his face cannot tempt the pain back. He doesn't want this love, but it seems that someone is determined to force-feed him this cure, this antidote.

But let it never be said that he took his medicine quietly.

"Matsumoto-fukutaicho, please take care of your captain." Unohana says gently, watching him weep with gentle concern in her eyes as she heads for the door. "As of now, he is officially placed on medical leave, as it will take a few days for him to be able to walk again."

Matsumoto nods once, her usually bubbly voice small as she agrees, and then she's back to trailing her hands through Toushiro's tangled, sweaty hair as he tries to swallow the cold ache in his chest. Eventually, he succeeds, but the effort leaves him exhausted and numb, and there's nothing more he'd like to do than sleep, but his pounding headache won't let him. He knows his facade has shattered now, his reputation as dignity and perfection epitomized evaporating like snow in August or silvery gin in the amber sun. And it kills him. He'd made such a monumental effort to ensure that nobody found out, and yet they had.

Rangiku's lips brush his forehead.

"When you're ready to talk, I'll be here, Taicho." she murmurs, and then her eyes bore into his and he seizes up, floating away on the silver-lined clouds of grieving dreams. Faintly, he understands that she's shown mercy, but even so, the loss of his last source of pain - his headache - finalizes the breaking of his stolen heart, and he slips into slumber if only to forget for a little while.

He wakes to find himself under house arrest on the concerned joint order of several captains, and as a tracking bracelet is locked around his ankle, he sits bitterly silent. Later, after Matsumoto tries to make lunch, he refuses to eat, lying tiredly in bed, unable to do anything except remember.

Three days pass. He refuses food, sips listlessly at water, the clear fluid barely seeping past his dry, cracking lips. Matsumoto yells at him, at her wits end, but he can't find the willpower to care. Pain gave him something to draw energy and motivation from, lust gave him a way to expend the excess, but now that both options are gone the only thing left is the smiling face of the man whom he'd loved.

One the fourth day, he's left alone for some reason - Unohana has isolated him from his division until she can create a 'treatment' plan - and he limps out from under the covers and into his living room, where a cabinet in the far corner of the room stands unguarded. He walks painfully over to this, the burning soreness at the base of his spine fresh relief from the internal turmoil which has gripped him so firmly, and kneels, opening the cabinet door to reveal a small assortment of bottles.

Pulling the tinkling glass containers from their dusty shelves in a chiming thunder of shattered moth wings, he drowns himself in amber, and the world dissolves into bittersweet gold memory. He can't remember what happens after that, only that he collapses on the floor in an intoxicated haze of regret and grief, lying haphazardly on his side as the world flickers in and out around him. He's aware of being very cold, and of the stench of vomit as a thin soup of bile and very little else forces its way up his throat and past his cracked lips onto the floor. But then there's light and vague noise and the high-pitched cry of a woman, and then there's nothing for a little while. He hovers curiously in that nothing, finding the blankness rather calming, then something tows him back with remarkable speed.

He surfaces slowly to the sound of hissing machines and a steady beep much unlike the throbbing beat of the bass. There's a woman sobbing close by, and the distraught cursing of a few men, but when he opens his eyes there's only one face that he can see, hovering right above his in perfect amber likeness.

 _"_ _ _Heya, Shirou-chan!"__ Ichimaru whispers to him, that Cheshire smile as wide as ever, the seafoam glint of his slitted eyes barely visible. _"_ _ _Ya dun look so good, chibi."__

Toushiro stares up at this glowing golden ghost.

"Gin..." he murmurs. He tenses, tears gathering in the corners of his eyes. "Oh, Gin..."

 _"_ _ _Shirou-chan!"__ his silver-haired lover trills cheerfully. _"_ _ _Yer blubberin' again. Are ya ever gonna stop that?"__

"I love you..." he whispers brokenly, and the golden ghost sighs in what seems like disappointment, then leans down to press a kiss to Hitsugaya's cold collarbone. The smaller, shorter of the two blinks in surprise, the gentle lips on his neck so intimate and so kind, yet so controlling. This is the Ichimaru he knows without a doubt, and he melts instantly, crying because he knows its a dream and smiling because he doesn't want to wake up.

 _"_ _ _Uh huh. I love ya too, chibi, fer what it's worth."__ Gin's expression is still drawn into that twisted leer that Toushiro always loved so much for shielding the former captain's true self from the outside world. _"_ _ _But ya gotta stop chasin' me. Ya nearly died this go round."__

The protest that wants to spill from that pale mouth is silenced in a bruising kiss, and the suave glamour of Gin's charm, inherited by his surviving lover, flares up in silver flame, warming Hitsugaya's cold husk of a body.

 _"_ _ _I love ya, chibi."__ Gin says again, beginning to dissolve. The sly man holds out a large, lovingly-fixed object glowing in silver, a crooked line of amber stitches running down the object's middle, and a smaller golden object in the same shape in his other hand. _"_ _ _So keep on bein' happy for the both of us, ne? And keep these safe fer me, would ya?"__

Hitsugaya swallows his tears and nods once, watching the golden phantom of his lover fade from sight.

"Will you...?"

 _"_ _ _I'll see ya again. Promise."__ Ichimaru swears, and then he's gone. Hitsugaya is left with the painful silver flash of Gin's smile in his returned, carefully-mended heart, and the amber warmth of Gin's love just beneath it. But he understands a little better what the man meant to do now, in leaving and dying so suddenly.

The real world clears in silver smoke, revealing a sterile white ceiling and the scent of antisceptic. There's a mask on his face and a tube in his arm, a careful monitor recording the sluggish beat of his patchwork heart, and he's wrapped in heavy white blankets like he's caught a cold - which, considering that he feels like he's been run over by a speeding mob of Eleventh Division shinigami, could be possible. From the corner of his eye he sees Hinamori and Matsumoto sitting in stunned silence, and the few assembled captains - Yamamoto, Ukitake, Kyoraku, and Kurosaki included - gaze at him in sudden understanding, though he doesn't know what happened yet. He groans weakly and tries to sit up, only to find that his forearms, waist, and calves have been secured with padded leather cuffs designed to prevent him from hurting himself, and he recognizes the cuffs with a grieving silence. Unohana approaches him as soon as he attempts to rise, her expression both concerned and stern.

"Hitsugaya-kun, do you know where you are?" she asks gently. Slowly, he nods, the oxygen mask on his face making it difficult to speak without taking awkward breaths. He's woken up in the Fourth enough times to recognize it instantly. But it seems that Unohana understands him. She sits primly down in a chair by his bed, glaring down at him.

"Good. Then do you know why you are here?" she asks. At this he pauses. His memory is unclear, but he remembers being upset and a lot of the color amber. He can guess well enough, and as the message sinks in he stiffens in surprise. Unohana watches his realization dispassionately, her disappointment clear.

"Two days ago, Matsumoto-fukutaicho called the Fourth with a case of severe alcohol poisoning - you. When I got to you, you had a blood-alcohol concentration of .33 percent, and you were breathing approximately twice a minute." she explains calmly. "Your heart rate had dropped to sixteen beats per minute, and your body temperature was approximately 29.5 degrees Celsius. If you had been left alone for another five minutes, you would have died."

Hitsugaya stares, then recalls that he consumed nearly an entire bottle of straight bourbon whiskey and reluctantly lowers his emerald gaze. Now he knows why he feels like shit, at least. Unohana watches him avert his eyes, worry plain on her deceptively kind face, genuine in her care yet duplicitous in her intent. Everyone in his room watches him with that same anguished look. But Matsumoto is the one who asks.

"Why, Taicho?" she murmurs, and he looks at her with tears in his eyes.

"Because...he always liked...bourbon best." he whispers weakly, amber-turning silvery tears running freely down his sensually chiseled features, and Matsumoto's eyes widen in understanding. She rises slowly to her feet, trembling.

"He was a Dom." she breathes, staring at him. The senior captains wince at the slang, but everyone understands. Toushiro closes his eyes.

"...not just...'a' Dom...Matsumoto." he tells her. Rangiku tears up.

"Yours. You were his Sub."

It's not a question, but a statement of fact, and Hitsugaya merely grimaces, choking on air, his body still frail from coming so close to death in so many different ways. Matsumoto kneels and hugs him after the fit passes, then looks at his brokenness and knows.

"You...loved him, didn't you?" she asks. Toushiro bites his lip.

"...I still do." he whispers back, finally confessing, and the amber sunset slowly deepens into silver-moonlit night.

 _ _Fin__

* * *

 **Erm...review?**

 **BTW - for those of you who are curious - yes, I meant for Hitsugaya & Ichimaru to have a healthy BDSM relationship. That's why our distraught Shirou is running around trying to forget him in any way possible.**


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